The Outer Space Men, LLC Outer Space Men Galactic Holiday Cobaltus of the Voidrillion Command Colossus Rex Action Figure The Outer Space Men, LLC, 2022
Day #2,508: February 2, 2023
Cobaltus of the Voidrillion Command Colossus Rex The Man from Jupiter
Outer Space Men Action Figures
Item No.: n/a Manufacturer:The Outer Space Men Includes:Colossus Rex Armor, Axe, Mace, and Alternate Hands; Gemini Staff and Blaster; Xodiac Staff and Blaster Action Feature:Pops apart Retail:$30.00 Availability: December 2022 Other: Accessorized
I have plenty of The Outer Space Men figures. I really didn't need this Galactic Holiday Cobaltus of the Voidrillion Command Colossus Rex but, also, I did. These guys are a lot of fun to mess with thanks to their accessories and how they scale with a lot of my favorite childhood figures... plus they look like they could have and indeed should have been in the background of 1970s space comic books. Mr. Rex was based on a bendy figure from Colorforms from 1969 who was big and green and had a mace. In 2013, the very first pull of the mold came out and the manufacturers added an armor, a big axe, and a shield along with alternate hands. It was a lot of plastic, and the hefty Jovian stands five inches high.
I wholeheartedly recommend fans of 3 3/4-inch scale action figures pick up one of this mold, in whatever color they can, just because it's neat. It's by no means cheap, but it somewhat keeps up with inflation and compared to mass-produced "deluxe" figures from Hasbro is priced somewhat comparably. $30.00 does sound, on its face, a little silly - but there are likely only hundreds, and low hundreds at that, of this figure and its target audience hit puberty before my parents met. To say the least, late-era Space Race-adjacent characters from before the moon landing aren't everybody's cup of tea. But they're absolutely my kind of thing.
The figure is currently the de facto mascot of The Outer Space Men, LLC and seems to be their company logo/mascot/icon. He's a spectacular design that was inspired by an unknown-to-me Frank Frazetta piece, so says Mel Birnkrant. (I should have asked him when I visited a few years ago.) This figure riffs on the original bendy figure with sculpting by the Four Horsemen, and it's incredible. There are hundreds of little scales all over the body, consistently created with a level of repetition that was either meditative or an early stage of madness. The figure's bulky build is the first thing you'll notice if you see this one in person, but the sculpted texture is just off-the-charts. Much simpler are his smooth claws and astro-underpants, but it's worth noting the detail on his face. The painted void around the white teeth really makes them pop, and the black sea in which his tiny red dot eyes sit are further bordered by dark blue paint. It's subtle, but the design work by the Glyos factory and Matt Doughty no doubt resulted in something that seems like it fell out of some alternate dimension's toy store.
The figure can pop apart at each joint so you can swap parts with other figures, or change out his open hands to closed fists which can hold his accessories. It's an expressive design choice that changes up his personality a bit. Similarly, you can pop off the head and arms to add (or remove) his harness which features painted spikes, painted rivets, and a big pink dot to match the trio on his belt. This is the kind of detail you get on indie figures that you may or may not get on mass-produced toys - surely, a major toymaker would've given you an unpainted accessory or no accessory at all. It has a bit of a The Road Warrior vibe, but so does the spiky alien. His thighs and shins have spikes for reasons I don't entirely know, and again, I really should have asked when I had a chance.
His blue deco seems like something straight out of Onell Design, and it might be inspired by the Onell Design Glyos OSM Colossus Rex Tyraxsis [FOTD #2,110] from way back in 2019. That figure was orange, and is surprisingly close to a photo negative of this release.
For reasons unknown, Gary Schaeffer added in lots of bonus gear in this figure's back. The arm-clip shield with Colossus Rex on it is included, as are his axe and mace, all cast in clear pink ABS. That's hard plastic, so don't bend it - it'll snap. Or stab you. Three accessories and two alternate hands is a lot of bonus gear, but they also included some of the clear pink accessories from Gemini (a blaster and a staff) plus Xodiac's Saturn-themed staff and blaster. Where I can store all the gear, I do not know, but I do appreciate its inclusion. While I was taking photos I realized you could put one of the spare Colossus Rex hands on the end of the Gemini staff and make a pretty great backscratcher for your action figures. (Charming.)
As a giant from the biggest planet in our solar system, Cobaltus of the Voidrillion Command Colossus Rex towers over your other 3 3/4-inch figures and his name implies there's possibly more story to tell - the name sounds like it came squarely from the imagination of Onell Design HQ, so we'll have to keep an eye out for hints of more story or connections there. I'd recommend you snag the classic green version of Colossus Rex first if you can... but if you can't? This one is great and has more stuff with him. Fans of old 3 3/4-inch space figures should add this to their stash, so he can hang out in your bar playsets with Walrus Man and his ilk. It's a pity he's too big to fit in so many classic toy vehicles, but those feet do pop off if you want to see if you can cram him in your Mini-Rigs, or just leave him intact and he can be one of Jabba's bodyguards. I really wish I had these figures when I was a child, so I'll probably always gush a bit about how much I love their imaginatively out-there ideas.
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